


i can't regret you, so i can't forget you

by orphan_account



Series: said and done [2]
Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Ghost Geralt, Hurt No Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-13
Updated: 2020-02-13
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:28:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22701757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Jaskier never really meant to follow Geralt as long as he did. He never really meant to get as attached as he did. That day, in that tavern on the edge of the world, Jaskier had seen Geralt and thought of all the stories a man like that must hold. He thought of all the sadness a man like that could hold.At first, he followed Geralt because it was good for his business.or, side b to stop haunting my dreams (please set me free)
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Series: said and done [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1632820
Comments: 7
Kudos: 95





	i can't regret you, so i can't forget you

**Author's Note:**

> once again i bring angst. this is a companion piece to stop haunting my dreams (please set me free) but you can read them in either order. still playing fast and loose with canon tho because i can.

Jaskier never really meant to follow Geralt as long as he did. He never really meant to get as  _ attached _ as he did. That day, in that tavern on the edge of the world, Jaskier had seen Geralt and thought of all the stories a man like that must hold. He thought of all the sadness a man like that could hold. 

At first, he followed Geralt because it was good for his business. 

Then he followed Geralt because it was good for  _ him _ . Jaskier was always a little on the selfish side - he liked finer things, the nicer things that life and his lovers could give him. Geralt gave him dirt for a bed, stars for a roof, and fresh rabbit for dinner. Geralt gave him a chance to see the world. Geralt gave him stories and songs. Geralt became his  _ friend. _

It didn’t take long for Geralt to become more than that.

The warm syrup feeling started in a backwater village, when he watched as Geralt crouched down to be eye-level with a young girl whose mother had been killed. She had seen it happen, and she had been babbling about what did it for days. Her father had told Geralt she was just traumatized, and didn't know what she was talking about.

Geralt thought otherwise. The Witcher listened closely as the little girl told Geralt what she saw. Geralt nodded intently as she spoke, even when the information just sounded like gibberish to Jaskier. 

The warm syrup feeling grew every time he saw Geralt smile, every time Geralt didn’t push him away, every time he caught Geralt listening to his songs with a content look. It grew every time Geralt said he wouldn’t get involved, but the instant someone is in danger,  _ he did _ . 

Jaskier is no fool. He knows what the feeling in his chest is. He’s experienced it often before, never as deep or full-bodied as he is experiencing now, but Jaskier is no stranger to love.

Oh, what a cruel irony to love someone who believes he cannot, who has said he doesn’t need anyone and doesn’t want anyone needing him. 

But it was okay, Jaskier would continue to love Geralt until Jaskier’s death. He would continue following the other man around the Continent for as long as he still could. Jaskier always expected to die first, to grow old and frail, to be the one who left Geralt behind.

He never expected Geralt to leave him behind. 

It all happened so fast. One second Geralt was there, triumphant over yet another monster. But the monster wasn’t quite dead. It lashed out, one last attack with the dregs of it strength, and Geralt chokes as his stomach is violently removed. 

Geralt collapses. Jaskier panics. 

There’s a hole in Geralt’s stomach that Jaskier can see the ground through, but he wants to believe, has to believe that Geralt will survive. He’s lived without Geralt before, and could do it again, but he doesn’t  _ want to _ . 

He tries his best, but it still isn’t enough. Geralt bleeds out dark and wet and slow into the dirt, and Jaskier cries and begs and pleads. Geralt dies, and something in Jaskier dies too. 

For a while, he takes to wondering about the Continent, a poor imitation of what he used to do with Geralt. But then a tavern in a decently sized town gives him a job, offers him a free room and a hot dinner every night for a portion of his profits and his songs.

So for the first time in a long time, Jaskier becomes not Jaskier the Wandering Bard, but Jaskier, the tavern entertainment. Being tied down leaves a bitter taste in his mouth, but Jaskier can’t bring himself to leave. It’s not the same, traveling alone. It will never be the same. 

Jaskier is playing in that tavern around lunch one day when he catches a flash of gold and white and black across the room. He’s been seeing these flashes out of the corner of his eye for years, ever since Geralt died, and every time he allows himself to hope that  _ maybe, maybe _ Geralt had survived after all. He knows that's foolish, knows that he was the one to bury the Witcher with his swords in the forest he died in. 

But he allows hope to bubble up again, and he looks up and - 

Locks eyes with Geralt, looking just the way he did when he died, blood coating his mouth, staining his armor darker than night. Jaskier can see the wall through the hole in Geralt’s stomach. 

Geralt opens his mouth, but blood comes out in place of words. It’s splatters on the floor, on his boots, on the shoes of the barmaid who just  _ walked through him. _

Jaskier’s heart swells with that sticky syrup feeling, his eyes water. He feels like the floor has fallen out from beneath him, like he’s falling and can’t stop. He’s pretty sure he faints. 

He dreams. Jaskier dreams of cold nights and a warm body pressed to his side. He dreams of gold bleeding into black, flashing in the moonlight when Geralt turns his attention from Jaskier to the fire. He dreams of white hair, turned almost brown with dirt and dried blood. He dreams of Geralt. He dreams of Geralt dying under his hands again. He dreams about the feeling of Geralt’s life oozing from between his fingers, and Jaskier wishes he could scrub hard enough to clean the blood from his hands.

When Jaskier wakes again, he’s in his room. His lute is propped up by the door, unharmed and intact. Good, that means he didn’t land on it when he fainted. 

Geralt is standing in the corner, a shadow of himself. 

The unsettled feeling returns, not as strong but still there. Jaskier feels like a boat, lost in the rough waves of his own thoughts. Geralt tries to speak again, and it makes Jaskier’s heart hurt.    
  
“Geralt…” Jaskier gets up. He wants to...wants to touch Geralt, to know that he’s not dreaming all of this again. When he tries, his fingertips go through Geralt’s chin. It feels like dipping his hand into a frozen lake. Jaskier jerks back with a gasp, and he can feel the tears already starting to fall. 

It’s not fair! Jaskier wants to stamp his foot and scream and cry because none of this is fair. He’d been doing okay, trying to settle back into the rhythm he had before he dedicated years to being with Geralt. But he doesn’t scream, and with startling clarity, Jaskier realizes that he never truly moved on. He thought he was doing okay but he wasn’t living, he was just surviving. 

How does he move on from a love like the one he has for Geralt? How does he move on when he never got the chance to say those words out loud because he was so sure that Geralt would reject him?

How can he move on when he knows that Geralt is stuck here?

He can’t stand the thoughts racing through his head, so he talks instead. “I thought...I thought I was crazy.” He swallows thickly, forcing words past the blockage in his throat. They come out faster and more shaky then he means them, but he just can’t stop. “Out of the corner of my eye, always flashes of white and gold and black. Geralt, it’s been  _ years, _ why are you here now, after all this time?”

Something flashes across Geralt’s face. Regret, anger, acceptance, a hundred emotions fill those gold eyes and Jaskier understands. For the first time, Geralt wants to talk, but he can’t. 

Jaskier gives him a wobbly smile, one that he hopes is more reassuring than it seems. “I guess we’ll have to wait for you to answer, huh?”

Geralt tilts his head to the side, brows furrowing. A clear marker of confusion that Jaskier only understands because he spent years deciphering all of Geralt’s nonverbal cues. If he had a voice, Jaskier is almost certain he would have said something like, “Jaskier, what the fuck does that mean?”

The familiarity brings forth a new batch of tears, and Jaskier is helpless to stem the emotions overflowing from him. But he struggles through them, clearing his throat just enough to explain. “Your wound,” Jaskier gestures to the hole in Geralt’s stomach. “It’s not as see-through as it was. I think, with enough time, you’ll be able to talk again.”

So Jaskier waits, and waits. He spends his time composing new songs and studying Geralt. It’s like..almost like Geralt never died. When Jaskier finds himself not wanting food, finds himself without the energy to even get up and bring the plate to him, Geralt is the one who shoves it over. When he gets lost in his own head while composing, when the black waters of his darkest thoughts threaten to drown him, Geralt is there, a cold presence that grounds Jaskier back in reality. 

Slowly, slowly, Jaskier begins to feel like he’s truly living and not just surviving. 

Slowly, slowly, Geralt begins to look more like himself. 

When he’s not working on a new song, Jaskier likes to debate why Geralt is tied to him. “It must be unfinished business, right?” Geralt shrugs. “But what unfinished business could  _ you _ have? You, sir Witcher, who told me more than once that you wanted  _ nothing, _ that you wanted  _ no one _ needing you.” Jaskier pauses, and his thoughts are racing again. There’s one, forming in the back of his mind that he doesn’t want to acknowledge. It’s the one that whispers,  _ you know why he is stuck. It’s the same reason you are stuck.  _ Jaskier ignores it and instead studies Geralt. “What did you leave behind, Geralt?”

Geralt shakes his head, and Jaskier sighs. The blood has stopped flowing everytime Geralt opens his mouth, but he still can’t form words. He tries, but it just sounds like gibberish to Jaskier. It’s frustrating for Geralt, Jaskier can tell. 

Jaskier sees it in the way Geralt paces on silent feet from one end of the room to the other. The way Geralt’s hands clench and unclench against his thighs, over and over until Jaskier wishes he could hold Geralt’s hand. He sees it in Geralt’s eyes and the furrow of his brow. 

Jaskier has never seen a time where Geralt wanted to talk as bad as he does right now. 

But there’s nothing Jaskier can do about it but wait, so he does. He’s composing a new song about this whole mess, and he’s finding it rather cathartic. For so long, he bottled up the sadness from Geralt’s death. Jaskier had changed many people’s opinions, but he hadn’t changed them all and he didn’t want to write a song about Geralt’s death only to have his crowds cheer and jeer when they realized that the  _ Butcher of Blaviken _ , the White Wolf,  _ Jaskier’s Witcher _ , was dead. 

Now he can’t find it in himself to care. The words are pouring out, formed and controlled by his emotions and he couldn’t stop them if he wanted to. But it’s okay because it’s shaping up to be one of the greatest songs Jaskier has ever written...if only he could get the last part of this verse right. 

He frowns and starts over, fingers sure on the strings of his lute.  _ “With every single day, it won't go away. The way I feel about you, and when it's said and done you're the only one…” _

And then Geralt is calling his name and Jaskier curses, startling so hard that he whacks his elbow into the chair he was occupying. He lets out a hiss between his teeth at the throb of pain up his arm before he glares up at Geralt. 

But Geralt is...Geralt is laughing, and Jaskier feels his irritation and pain melt away. Geralt is breathtaking, always has been, but here, now… He looks younger. So much younger than Jaskier has ever seen him. Geralt is no longer bowed under the weight of the world on his shoulders, and the lines around his eyes, from years of stress and conflict, are barely there. He looks  _ alive _ , even though Jaskier’s traitorous brain reminds him that no, Geralt is most certainly dead. 

Geralt breaks the silence. “Was that song about me?”

Should he answer that, honestly? It’s kind of a dumb question. He sighs and straightens up. “Who else would it be about, Geralt?” Jaskier can’t keep the defeat from his voice. He’s tried to keep his feelings on the backburner for so long because the thought of losing Geralt  _ (again) _ is more painful than he’s willing to admit. 

“I love you.”

Jaskier’s heart skips a beat. “Is that why you’ve been haunting my dreams since you died?” He can’t believe that he’s hearing this now. Jaskier almost wants to pinch himself to make sure this isn’t just another dream, one where he gets what he  _ knows _ he cannot have. He takes a sharp breath, and lets it out slow. It’s shaky, betraying his inner turmoil. “You don’t get to do this to me, Geralt. I’ve loved you for years and it took your death to get you to say it back?”

And Jaskier, Jaskier wants more than anything to be angry, like he knows he probably should be, but it doesn’t come. He’s tired of playing this keep-away with Geralt. 

“I was…” Geralt frowns. “I didn’t want to tie you to me. It never ends well.”

And Jaskier wants to laugh in his face. Of course Geralt would think like that, after what happened with Yennefer and the djinn. But Jaskier knows he never would’ve thought of it like that. Jaskier wanted Geralt, whatever Geralt would give him, and even if he had to share a piece of Geralt with the sorceress it would be  _ okay _ . Just like how Jaskier knew it was okay when he shared a piece of himself with one of his paramours. Jaskier’s heart was too big to be contained by just one person, and Geralt knew that, but what he didn’t understand was that Jaskier wanted it anyways. 

“I miss you.” Jaskier’s voice cracks. “I miss you so much it hurts.” And he’s telling the truth. There’s no pretty ballad to hide under, and it leaves Jaskier feeling exposed. “I never considered myself one to get attached. It was always easier to just love shallowly, to be enamored with whoever was in front of me because it was fun. But then you came along, with your…” Jaskier waves a hand in the general direction of Geralt. “Your everything. Your moral code, your eyes, your smile, the way you spoke to children, and the way, even though you like to say you didn’t, you always got involved if it meant no more people had to die. Even when they spat on you, you were still the first one to help.” Jaskier takes a deep breath. “But then you happened, and loving you felt so natural it was scary.”

And that’s the crux of the matter isn’t it? Jaskier loves Geralt. Geralt loves Jaskier. 

“I’m sorry,” Geralt says. Jaskier isn’t sure what Geralt is apologizing for, but it doesn’t really matter. “I love you and I was too afraid to tell you in life, but I’m here now. I wanted you to know, felt you deserved that much, at least.”

They really were both fools. Maybe, just maybe, if either of them had spoken up, they wouldn’t be in this situation. Even so, knowing that Geralt loves him makes Jaskier’s heart swell. His smile is watery, and he knows it doesn’t reach his eyes, but it’s a genuine one. The saddest smile Jaskier has ever given. “I love you too, you stupid, stupid oaf.”

Jaskier finally feels at peace. 

Geralt starts to fade. “Jaskier.”

“I know.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I know.”

“I love you.”

“I know.”

When Geralt is gone, all that Jaskier has left is a memory. 

**Author's Note:**

> the song jaskier sings and the title are from [can't forget you](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iC6dQuZPVA) by my darkest days


End file.
